The United States saw a mini jobs boom in October, snapping a four-month streak of payroll losses but not enough to dent the high unemployment rate, official data showed yesterday.

The Labour Department reported the creation of 151,000 nonfarm jobs in October, much better than expected, and the jobless rate as expected remained unchanged at 9.6 percent for the third month in a row.

The number of new jobs was more than double the 60,000 forecast by most analysts. The Labour Department slashed its initial estimate of 95,000 job losses in September to 41,000.

The private sector powered the turnaround, according to the report, especially the vast services sector, which makes up more than 80 per cent of the US economy.

The private sector added 159,000 jobs, eclipsing the loss of 8,000 government payrolls. Service providers added 154,000 jobs.

The consensus forecast was for 60,000 new private-sector jobs in October. The department hiked its original September estimate of 64,000 private payrolls to 107,000.

“This was an excellent report that shows the economy is moving on a slow and steady pathway toward full recovery,” said Joel Naroff at Naroff Economic Advisers.

“The business sector is joining in the party and it also appears that small to midsized firms are adding workers as well.”

The jobs report and its details suggested a stronger recovery was underway in the private sector than previously believed.

President Barack Obama, whose Democrats were trounced by Republicans in congressional and local elections Tuesday, hailed the report as “encouraging news,” but said it was “not good enough” to bring down an unacceptable unemployment rate.

“I am open to any idea, any proposal, any way we can get the economy growing faster so that people who need work can find it faster,” he said, including tax breaks which are popular among Republicans.